A useful SQL function to parse a single string with delimited values for the "N"th occurrence  Read more...

No, I’m not talking about a Dickens novel. I’m talking about the number of characters in a string. I had a painful time recently because of the word “characters.”   Read more...

Often in database design we store different values in rows to take advantage of a normalized design. However many times we need to combine multiple rows of data into one row for a report of some sort. New author Carl P. Anderson brings us some interesting T-SQL code to accomplish this.  Read more...

I found something interesting the other day. I was attempting to optimize a very heavy string parsing routine using T-SQL and was having problems. I don’t normally use T-SQL for such heavy string parsing, but this was a special case of a legacy structure that I had to work with, so I had no choice.   Read more...

The statement is splited into columns according the delimter and it has been captured in the table datatype.  Read more...

Learn how you can split a delimited string in a single query using XML with Divya Agrawal.  Read more...

Unlike other relational database management systems that shall remain nameless, SQL Server's underlying coding language, T/SQL, does not have a built-in function for padding string values. I recently took it upon myself to create my own and as you'll see I got a little carried away  Read more...

This function returns the proper case of any given string.   Read more...

Find And Replace any string, in the entire table with this function. Parameterized for easy use.   Read more...

If a column is normalized, but the user really wants to see the values as a short comma separated list, how can I write a query that produces the list? Concatenating the values in a column would be pretty easy if SQL Server had a concatenate aggregate function, which it doesn't. What's more, for efficiency sake it's important to write the reporting queries without using cursors.  Read more...

A useful user defined function for padding values from the left or right with any token, number, or character.   Read more...

Feed it two delimited strings of horizontal data and it returns it back as a vertical table with the two column data in the same synchronized position order.  Read more...

Feed it large strings of double-delimited horizontal data and it returns it back as a non-pivoted vertical table with a 2-diemensional star schema.  Read more...

Feed it delimited horizontal data and it returns it back as a vertical table.  Read more...

Feed it double-delimited horizontal data and it returns it back as a non-pivoted vertical table with a 2-diemensional star schema.  Read more...

It is a simple routine that we all need to use occasionally; parsing a delimited list of strings in TSQL. In a perfect relational world, it isn't necessary, but real-world data often comes in a form that requires one of the surprising variety of routines that Anith Sen describes, along with sage advice about their use.  Read more...

I have a need to pass an entire table of data as a parameter to a COM+ component. I found that a simple XML call did the job.  Read more...

This simple script retrieves a range of values from a table and presents the results as a string.  Read more...

This artcle by new author Manie Verster examines the use of the PATINDEX function in T-SQL.  Read more...

This article from Wayne Sheffield shows how the use of XML can speed up those string manipulations in your T-SQL code.  Read more...

Learn how you can split a delimited string in a single query using XML with Divya Agrawal.  Read more...

Often in database design we store different values in rows to take advantage of a normalized design. However many times we need to combine multiple rows of data into one row for a report of some sort. New author Carl P. Anderson brings us some interesting T-SQL code to accomplish this.  Read more...

This article from Wayne Sheffield shows how the use of XML can speed up those string manipulations in your T-SQL code.  Read more...